BUNKER 0

2025 Marsala, Sicily

Site-specific ecological installation, 24 stainless steel markers, ongoing

I created BUNKER 0 on a stretch of coastline in Marsala, Sicily, where I spent part of my childhood.

When I was young, a Second World War bunker stood on the beach. It was part of the landscape of summer: swimming, fishing, walking, playing. Today, the bunker stands isolated in the sea. The structure itself has not moved. The coastline has.

The work consists of twenty-four stainless steel markers installed along an imaginary line connecting the bunker to the present shoreline. Together they trace the physical distance between memory and geography.

Each marker contains an engraved sentence collected from local residents: fishermen, children, parents, elderly people, visitors. Some are memories, some are observations, some are simple descriptions. Together they form a collective narrative of a place that is slowly disappearing.

At the time of installation, every marker was engraved with a horizontal line indicating the sea level. Each year, a new red ring is added to record changes in water level and coastal conditions. The installation therefore functions not only as a sculpture but also as a long-term environmental archive.

The project began with a personal memory but evolved into a reflection on a much larger condition. Across the world, coastlines are changing, landscapes are retreating, and places that once seemed permanent are becoming unstable. These transformations often occur so slowly that they remain invisible in everyday life.

BUNKER 0 attempts to make that process visible.

The bunker itself plays a central symbolic role. Built to defend a border during wartime, it now serves as a fixed point from which environmental change can be measured. What was once military infrastructure has become a witness to a different form of transformation.

The work occupies a space between public memory, ecological observation, and social participation. It does not represent climate change metaphorically. Instead, it allows visitors to encounter its consequences through a specific place, a measurable distance, and a shared history.

As years pass, the installation will continue to grow. New red rings will accumulate. New generations will add new memories. The markers will gradually become a timeline written simultaneously by people and by the sea.

The subject of the work is not the bunker.

The subject is the beach that disappeared.